Potter's future as Chelsea boss hanging in balance as Boehly makes decision
To sack, or not to sack, that is the question.
Well, it's certainly the one being put to Chelsea chairman Todd Boehly, who wasted no time ousting Champions League-winning boss Thomas Tuchel for his man Graham Potter after taking over from Roman Abramovich in June 2020.
As things stand, Boehly has absolutely no intention of pulling the trigger and reliving Potter of his duties, despite Chelsea falling to 10th in the Premier League - a staggering 11 points behind fourth-place Tottenham in the first Champions League spot - and growing frustration among the fans.
This weekend saw Chelsea beaten at home by Premier League basement dwellers Southampton, which poses the question... is Boehly right to back his man and give him the time needed to turn things around or should he swallow his pride and say goodbye?
We asked our Mirror Football experts for their opinion on the hot topic.
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DARREN LEWIS - Not to sack!
We've all watched way too much football to believe you can just throw a new group of players together and expect them to turn into a winning machine instantly. Chelsea are in a bad run of form but Potter hasn't become a bad manager overnight.
A big part of the reason why he was successful at Brighton and Ostersunds was the patience both clubs had to allow his methods to come to fruition.
Why should Chelsea be any different?
It is understandable that fans are unhappy. The numbers make for horrendous reading.
But Boehly and Behdad Eghbali are right to stick by Potter and it's a good job they made clear from the get-go that he is their man.
Graham Potter is under growing pressure at Chelsea (Getty Images)HAVE YOUR SAY! Should Graham Potter be sacked as Chelsea boss? Comment below
Arsenal's board were equally supportive behind the scenes when Mikel Arteta went through a nightmare run and debates just like this were doing the rounds.
Guess which team is now top of the league.
What Potter has to do now is play with a striker. He has one. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. Even if he comes on for the last 20-30 minutes of matches.
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He is needed. Chelsea can't score goals. They are not good enough to freeze him out. He is the man who could stop the clamour for Potter's job from becoming too deafening to ignore.
DAVID MADDOCK - Not to sack!
No, Potter shouldn't be sacked. You can't bring in a new manager who has made his name on building a squad, and developing it through coaching over a period of time, and then get rid of him after a few months. That would suggest an appointment without due diligence, it would suggest the owners don't know what they're doing.
I'd turn the question around though. Should Potter resign? Given the qualities mentioned above, maybe he has to face a serious decision of whether the club is right for him. He's clearly a fine coach, and perhaps he's wasting his time at a club which has never given managers time... or respect.
DARREN WELLS - To sack!
The question Boehly needs to truly answer is whether he is 100 per cent confident Potter is the man to take Chelsea forward - even if they fail to qualify for the Champions League.
Make no mistake, despite all the riches available to him, Potter has a tough task on his hands to knit together a dressing room full of so many talented players - many of whom have had their noses put out of joint by the sudden overhaul, as well as the departure of well-liked Thomas Tuchel.
Potter needs time to trim his squad to create a more harmonious dressing room and implement his philosophy - but you can't hide the fact he should be doing much better with the players at his disposal. Chelsea look like a sinking ship at present.
Is the job too big for him? Perhaps. Or maybe he's just not the right fit. Sacking managers on a whim is not the way to build a long-term project, but there are others on the market who you'd back to get more out of this team - and there is still just about time to turn the season around if Boehly is prepared to be ruthless.
If Potter's his man, Boehly should stick with him for the foreseeable - with or without Champions League football next season.
If not, Chelsea need to make a change - the quicker, the better.
MIKE WALTERS - Not to sack!
Potter would be the easy way out, the coward's choice, caving to the knee-jerk tendency.
At some point, owners and directors need to stand by their judgement because English football's sacking culture is getting out of hand.
Nathan Jones was given just 14 games at Southampton, Rob Edwards lasted only 11 games at Watford, and Neil Critchley walked the plank on Sunday night at QPR after 12 games.
Surely Potter deserves more than five months - not least because Chelsea's breathless £600 million splurge on new signings since Boehly bought the club has landed him with a huge cast of expensive players and he cannot accommodate them all.
If they sack Potter now, the next guy on the coconut shy at Stamford Bridge would inherit the same problem.
Yes, results need to improve.
Yes, Potter needs to establish his best team and stop shuffling the pack.
And, yes, mid-table irrelevance is hard for Chelsea fans to swallow after two decades of success financed by Roman Abramovich's largesse.
Todd Boehly is backing his man for now (Marc Atkins/Getty Images)But how about a bit of humility?
When the jigsaw pieces fit - and there's enough of them - somebody is going to get a hiding.
I admire Boehly for standing by his man. Potter was his choice, his man to lead the 'project' (God, I hate that word) - let him get on with it.
ALEX RICHARDS - Not to sack!
Boehly and the Chelsea owners thought that Potter was the right appointment for the long-term future of the club.
If that's what they believed when they poached him and his staff from Brighton, then they need to continue to back that judgment.
The Blues have been on a horrific recent run, but you could argue that their performances have deserved more. In the losses to both Southampton and Borussia Dortmund in the past week, they were much the better side both times - it's just in front of goal they're missing chances galore and it's costing them.
Potter has tried to lay down foundations in terms of a style of play, but has had injuries to key players - notably Reece James and Ben Chilwell, who remain absolutely critical to this side - and has had to integrate signings galore.
Chelsea were beaten by Southampton on the weekend (Getty Images)Certainly, it's right that he's under pressure from supporters because the results aren't there. But Boehly and co need to stick to the long-term script, which, it's understood, is their preferred course of action.
Potter has yet to fail as a manager anywhere, at any level. If they truly believe that this season can be written off, then they need to back their initial judgment and stick with their man.
BEN HUSBAND - To sack!
Potter will point to a process... but does that process really involve losing at home to Southampton?
It's not just that results are bad, Potter is stumbling into the very same issues he encountered at Brighton. Nice, but ultimately toothless football.
Potter is widely acknowledged as a fantastic coach, but the slump at Stamford Bridge has now firmly set in. He consistently states that this is still a new team finding its feet. It may be better for all parties if a different coach finds them.
Neil McLeman - Not to sack!
Not yet but he is on borrowed time.
Potter would already be gone under the Abramovich era. But the former Russian owner would never have appointed a coach with no big-club experience or spent big money in such a random fashion during his ruthless era.
Yet the problems did not start with Potter or the new regime. Chelsea splashed over £200 on Romelu Lukaku, Timo Werner and Kai Havertz without buying a reliable goalscorer - and allowed Tuchel to sign Aubameyang before sacking the German.
It has seen Chelsea become like Brighton without the sea on a bigger budget - lots of passing without a forward line to score goals. The random spending by the new regime has not helped this club, which won the Champions League less than two years ago, should not be losing at home to Southampton and be in 10th place.
Potter's touchline body language does not matter. Results do - and wins will quell growing supporter discontent. He needs to decide on his best team and pick it every game for the rest of the season, which means starting with Reece James and Thiago Silva.
Finishing outside the top seven this season would prove the job is too big for him.
JOSH O'BRIEN - To sack!
Chelsea should part ways with Potter as soon as possible.
That is not to suggest Potter isn't a good manager, nor that he wouldn't fare much better at a different big-six side, but this one never felt like a match made in heaven.
None of the signings that were made last month feel as if they were made with Potter's preference and style of football in mind, with each passing match-week he looks more and more helpless on the Stamford Bridge touchline.
Many fans and pundits alike have honed in on how the Blues boss conducts himself in press conferences and used that as a stick to beat him with. That much is unfair, not every successful manager has to antagonise or provoke to get results.
But Potter does need to find what is going to work for him and find it fast, as patience in him is already wearing thin among large sections of the Stamford Bridge faithful.
JENNY BROWN - Not to sack!
There's no denying that under Chelsea's previous regime, Potter would have been gone before most people had taken down their Christmas trees.
Despite a bright start and an unbeaten run of nine matches - while qualifying for the Champions League knockout stages with ease - things look to have gone backwards under the former Brighton boss.
Todd Boehly hired Graham Potter after sacking Thomas Tuchel (Getty Images)
Although injuries and a bloated squad with too many new additions have played a part, there's no excuse for losing at home to a manager-less team sitting bottom of the table.
There's no excuse, either, for failing to net only three times in nine games after buying every available attacking player under the sun.
However, without a pre-season and a massive clearout, it's difficult to say whether Potter can still work his magic. With few managerial options that fit the profile that Boehly is looking for, he will stick with his man for now. But the new owner needs to brace for a toxic turn if there isn't a return to winning ways soon.
DANIEL ORME - To sack!
It's hard to suggest that Todd Boehly's punt on Graham Potter has gone the way any of the Stamford Bridge hierarchy wanted it to go.
Saturday's drab defeat by struggling Southampton is the latest in a long line of woeful results - a run that has seen the Blues lose ten out of their last 16 matches in all competitions. For a club so accustomed to winning as Chelsea have been over the last two decades, that is simply not good enough.
There is no doubt that Potter is an excellent manager - his jobs with Ostersunds and Brighton vouching for that - but the Chelsea role just seems slightly too far for him at the current time. He seems incapable of arresting the current malaise in west London and that could have disastrous consequences for the Blues.
A trophyless season can happen but the fact that Chelsea look on the verge of missing out on European football in its entirety - nonetheless a place in the Champions League - would certainly damage the club. The lack of the financial riches that a place at the top table of European football could certainly come back to bite the Blues considering their six-month splurge under their new American owners.
With Arsenal and Manchester United resurgent, this term and Liverpool expected to put together a revival, Chelsea face being left behind by the rest of the Premier League big six should Potter not be moved on.
TOM VICTOR -Not to sack!
The Potter argument is a difficult one. If Boehly was unprepared to give Tuchel time for his new signings to bed in, the case for Potter being allowed to do the same with similarly underwhelming results might be considered flimsy at best.
There's a difference, though. Potter is the owner's choice, and the behaviour of Boehly in his first year or two in charge could set the tempo for how he will be perceived throughout his reign.
Buying your way to a seat at the top table isn't as easy as it was when Abramovich took over in 2003, and there is no guarantee a change of manager at this stage would be the magic bullet needed to secure a top-four finish. With that said, though, we do not know how damaging it would be for Chelsea to miss out on Champions League football.
One thing in Potter's favour is events a few miles up the road at Arsenal, where Arteta looked from the outside like he wouldn't be the answer, right up until the point that it turned out he was.
Rather than setting a worrying precedent of hiring and firing, it makes some sense for Chelsea to at least wait until the summer and see if there are any signs of movement in the right direction, but it would be naive to rule out another change entirely.
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